


Plan For All Contingencies

by muirgen_lys



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Anders is a badass, BAMF Anders, Canon-Typical Violence, Fenris is intrigued, Gen, Hawke is flabbergasted, Varric is amused, but too self controlled to really show it, pretty much angst-free
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-12
Updated: 2015-12-12
Packaged: 2018-05-06 09:37:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5411921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/muirgen_lys/pseuds/muirgen_lys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anders loses his staff in a fight, and is forced to defend himself with a sword, which he does quite competently thank you very much. why is everyone staring?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Plan For All Contingencies

**Author's Note:**

> From the kmeme - http://dragonage-kink.livejournal.com/15195.html?thread=60396123#t60396123

“This is _not_ my idea of a good time.” Hawke grimaced and spat. It didn't help; her mouth still tasted like blood. A blade swung towards her, and she fell back a pace to avoid it, fingers flexing on the grips of her knives. She retreated from the next stroke too. On the third she ducked under it and stepped inside. One knife found the Qunari's kidney. The other landed in his throat. She jerked them free, and let the body fall.

“Point to me,” she said, glancing around the battlefield. “I assume we're keeping scor- uhnf.”

She stumbled forward, caught herself, and turned to kick the asshole who'd slammed into her in the knee. He dropped as his leg gave way, then fell forward as Fenris gutted him.

She met the elf's eyes and grinned, then turned, leaving him to watch her back while she surveyed the battlefield.

Varric was maybe fifteen yards up the way, drifting to his left, eyes on the battle, as he slid another bolt into Bianca. Anders - blast. The mage was pinned down on a rise, with a ten foot drop at his back and four Qunari closing in on him. None of them looked pleased with the arrangement – in fact two of them were on fire, and the other two smoked dully – but they weren't backing down.

And Hawke had too many problems of her own right now to pull them off him.

Fenris shouted a warning, and she ducked and missed being decapitated by a hair.

Back to work then.  
  
*  
  
Anders blocked a sword stroke with his staff, wincing at the heavy thud. A good staff was a precise magical instrument that deserved to be handled with care. Admittedly this was more of a crude, kind-of-okay staff, but it still wasn't really meant for melee combat.

Unfortunately with four over-muscled Qunari within sword range, avoiding melee combat was no longer looking like an option. He slammed the end of the staff into the ground, sending out a shockwave of magical energy that forced them back a few steps, and followed up by spinning the staff over his head and into the left temple of the nearest attacker, hitting about two inches below the horns. The warrior dropped like a stone, and Anders grinned.

One down, three to go.  
  
*  
  
Hawke watched the battle on the other side of the path in sporadic glimpses – a quick look here and there, when she could spare a second's attention from her own opponent.

Varric had backed up another thirty feet, and was raining destruction down on the enemy. The field was dotted with bodies with crossbow bolts sticking out of various important places.

Anders was still nearly surrounded, and going by the simplicity of his attacks, dangerously low on mana.

A sword whipping past her face demanded her attention, and she sidestepped and sliced at the arm holding it, leaving a shallow cut along the wrist

“Hawke, _the mage!_ ”

She looked up to see Anders throw the two splintered pieces of his now-useless staff at the attacking Qunari.

Shit.

Anders ducked and lunged but the range was too small; he couldn't move far enough for it to matter. Fenris and Hawke took off towards him in the same instant, though Fenris, lyrium-enhanced, faster, quickly pulled ahead. Neither of them was going to make it in time. The elf was still more than six yards away when the Qunari's two-handed sword swept down towards the now-defenseless mage.

And crashed sideways with a sound of metal on metal.  
  
*  
  
Anders felt the wood creak under his hands. The next blow would shatter it, and Maker damn it, he did _not_ have the money for a new staff right now.

He made the block anyway, and grimaced in bitter vindication as the wood cracked and split. He tossed the wreckage in the Qunari's face, and threw himself forward, grabbing for the blade his latest attacker had dropped.

He swung it up and around, and managed to divert the heavy two-handed sword perhaps eight inches to the right. The flat of it smacked against his hip as it came down, and he set _that_ particular experience aside as something to panic over later, when he had time.

The sword he had stolen was one of a pair of shortswords, which meant it was full-length for him, but still probably faster than the massive two-hander. He took advantage, twisting the sword and bringing it around flat to bite into the warrior's unarmoured bicep.

The Qunari grunted, and Anders drew back with a mad grin. _Yeah, try and lift that behemoth again. I dare you._ Of course the warrior knew as well as he did that it wasn't going to happen: the sword dropped to the ground, and a large grayish fist swung towards Anders' stomach. Anders cut downwards at the arm, leaving a long slice that bled freely and redirecting the blow down and to the side. It hit him anyway, but the angle was wrong, the force bruising rather than fatal. He brought the sword across his opponent's neck, and stepped forward to take on the pair behind.  
  
*  
  
A swing, and a miss, and he'd opened himself too far. Somebody bashed a pommel into his face, and he stumbled back, cursing incoherently. But the Qunari were tiring too and the next strike was off: he dodged left to avoid it, and managed a cut across the Qunari's stomach that would pull and widen the more he moved. Not a death blow, at least not any time soon, but it would slow him down. He stepped back and checked his pool of mana.

Still not much recovered, but enough for this.

He drew on what power he had, shaped it, and moved it through his hands to send lightning sparking down his blade.

The next clash of steel carried a hefty shock, and the Qunari warrior fell back, shaking out one slightly-singed hand. Anders took back the ground he'd lost, and lashed out again. This time the warrior was ready, but even braced for it, the shock stung. Anders bared his teeth and pushed himself harder, dropping the lightning spell, instead spending his remaining dregs of mana to augment his exhausted muscles. Three rapid strokes - the first two were easy blocks, but they pushed the warrior's one remaining blade out of line, and he could -

He stepped forward, and dropped into a crouch, ignoring the crackling in his knees ( _Andraste's ample tits, he was too young to be creaking like this_.) His blade went into the backs of his opponent's ankles with a satisfying thunk and crunch, and then there was a scream and the Qunari toppled forward like a felled tree.

Anders surged to his feet to take on the next attacker...but there was none. Only Fenris, standing covered in blood, with two dead Qunari at his feet and a curious expression on his face. He was...quite a sight, really.

Come to think of it, Anders was probably a sight himself. Edged weapons were fucking unsanitary. He looked down at his coat, and confirmed, with faint dismay, that it was going to need washing, probably with magic, and even then the blood might not come out of the quilting.

He looked back up to find Fenris still regarding him. Hawke, a little further off, was doing likewise. 

For half a second, he had an impulse to turn around and see what they were really looking at. But no, there was nothing but him on this end of the rise. “Is there a reason we're all looking at me?”

“I was not aware you were trained with a sword,” said Fenris.

Hawke was more eloquent. “Are you _insane?_ ” she demanded. “Where in the fucking void did that come from? Where has it _been_ all this time? Are you some kind of mystical warrior from the dawn of time? _Explain yourself!_ ”

Anders couldn't help it; he laughed. Which only made her sputter harder. “I was a Warden, Hawke,” he managed at last. “Did you think the darkspawn always stayed at a respectful distance?”

“Of course not,” she said, “but-”

“The Warden-Commander believed in being prepared,” he said. “Cross-training on different disciplines, different fighting styles...let me tell you, even in practice, facing off against that woman with a sword will give you an appreciation for a pacifist lifestyle.”

Hawke was still gaping a bit. Behind her, Varric appeared to be taking notes. “So you learned all this and then you just what, _forgot_ when you came to Kirkwall?”

“Obviously not,” put in Fenris drily.

“Then why-?”

“I don't like the mess,” he replied blandly. At her answering glare, he sighed. “Magic is nearly always easier, and in shorter supply,” he pointed out. “And as much as I dislike doing it, most staves can be used as melee weapons in a pinch. But Brosca's rule was that you had to know how to use something else, just in case your staff happened to get hewn in half in battle. Speaking of which, you owe me a new staff.”

Hawke waved this off with an of-course gesture, as if she were coerced into buying staves for apostates on a weekly basis. “I still can't believe you just _hid_ this from us.”

“I wasn't hiding anything,” he told her. “It didn't come up. And probably never will again.”

“Oh no,” she said, shaking her head. “Your secret is out; you're not getting out of this now. Anders, you wait. Tomorrow morning, sunrise, I'm turning up at your door and dragging you out to sparring practice with Aveline and Fenris and me.”

Anders' face took on a pained expression. “Hawke, my patients show up at all hours of the night-”

“This'll force you to get a good sleep then. Which come to think of it is another advantage.”

Fenris gave a slow, predatory smile. “Perhaps the mage simply fears to face us. Do I frighten you more than this warden?”

Ander shot him a look, but he was hooked and he knew it. “It's a tie,” he said. “I don't want to fight either of you.” His expression turned thoughtful. “though come to think of it,” he went on, “you and Brosca - that's a fight I'd love to see.”

Fenris raised an eyebrow. “You want me to fight the Hero of Ferelden?”

“Friendly sparring only,” The mage gave his blood-spattered coat one last, woeful look, then sighed and started walking. “You'd've liked her,” he told the elf. “All of your patience and regard for people's delicate sensibilities, but with less snark and more fatalism.”

Fenris snorted. “How exactly did she put up with you?”

“I'll have you know I'm a delight to be around. Anyway she was...”

Varric fell in step behind them, eavesdropping for all he was worth. This was going to make a heck of a yarn for the illustrious denizens of the Hanged Man.


End file.
